


Ten Years

by etothepii



Category: Nolanverse - Fandom
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-08-18
Updated: 2008-08-18
Packaged: 2017-10-13 22:32:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,230
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/142438
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/etothepii/pseuds/etothepii
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It’s hard to really <i>hate </i>someone once you’ve known them for ten years.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ten Years

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into 中文 available: [Ten Years 十年](https://archiveofourown.org/works/7006438) by [jls20011425](https://archiveofourown.org/users/jls20011425/pseuds/jls20011425)



> Written for the Batman Kink Meme. Prompt was Batman + Joker friendship.

It’s hard to really _hate_ someone once you’ve known them for ten years. That wasn’t to imply Batman thought the Joker was redeemable, or good, or even _sane_. The Joker was still his arch-nemesis and he was still a dangerous criminal who belonged in Arkham for the rest of his life. But it was hard to _hate_ him, not in the way he’d used to hate him. They’d just... gotten used to each other.

It was the small things at first. A mobster would be gunning for the Joker, and Batman would put them behind bars before any elaborate assassination plots could play out—but the mobster was wanted by the police and undoubtedly a murderer, so why _wouldn’t_ he take them out as soon as possible? Or a new criminal, planning to make a legend of himself, would show up dead with a Glasgow grin and a Joker card between his teeth and it’d turn out he’d been halfway through a plan that ended with the Batman dead (and half of Gotham in flames). But young kids with dumb plans rarely lasted long in Gotham’s dark underbelly.

It wasn’t _unusual_ or anything. Sometimes Batman’s enemies were the Joker’s enemies, and sometimes the Joker’s enemies happened to be Batman’s enemies. They both had a lot of enemies, collected them like normal people collected stamps or coins. It was inevitable that there’d be some overlap.

And Batman wasn’t a murderer, and it’d be murder by inaction if he’d _let_ the Joker burn to death in a flaming building during that time his henchmen had turned on him. So there was really nothing he could do _but_ pull him out and (unfortunately) leave him alone to escape while he went back to check for more survivors. Human life was human life, and no one deserved to die.

And the Joker _had_ told Batman repeatedly that he was too fun to kill, well before the time he’d found Batman bleeding and unconscious after a nasty run-in with the police during the hate part of Batman’s love-hate relationship with the GCPD. Besides, he’d stuck a Joker card in the sliver of space between Batman’s cheek and cowl, and then left him at a hospital which was soon teeming with policemen eager to apprehend him. It was more a practical joke than a favor, even if Batman had, after being treated, escaped with minimal difficulty.

It was during year eight of their mutual enmity that things started to get complicated. The Joker was still the Joker. He killed people, caused mayhem, and generally made things difficult for the citizens of Gotham. And Bruce was still Batman. He cleaned corruption from the streets and sent criminals to prison, a symbol of hope for Gotham’s innocents.

But when, in a stroke of dumb luck, the police arrested Bruce Wayne on suspicion of being Batman (the charges sounded as ridiculous in the morning papers as they had in his head, but he’d still been behind bars), Batman was clearly seen on the streets two nights later, interrupting a drug smuggling ring and bringing the ringleaders to justice. Bruce was released with a _very_ contrite apology from not only the Mayor, but the Police Commissioner and DA as well.

Afterwards, a Joker card arrived in the mail for him. Analysis showed no signs of poison or DNA, either the Joker’s or that of any potential victims. Bruce taped it to the side of his computer monitor, in the Batcave.

So when he next crashed into the Joker’s secret lair, intent on bringing him and his henchmen to justice (again), Batman was laughed at and mocked when he offered a halting, uncertain apology for ruining the Joker’s nice furniture and destroying his plans. Once all of his goons were on the ground, groaning in pain, the Joker didn’t even struggle. They’d established during year four that on an even playing field, Batman could beat the crap out of the Joker with minimal difficulty, so now the Joker only fought back when he had something up his sleeve, sometimes literally. It wasn’t a big deal.

The big deal was when during his stay at Arkham Asylum, the Joker sent Bruce Wayne (as well as the mayor, the police department, and half a dozen each of Gotham’s most famous celebrities and wealthy people) a long, rambling letter complaining about the unjust use of electroshock therapy, terrible living conditions, and boring company.

Shortly after the director of Arkham Asylum replied to Bruce Wayne that although a donation was nice, nothing could be done about inmate treatment or living conditions and that scum like that deserved anything they got, the Joker escaped from Arkham. This was unusual only because no other inmates had escaped with him, and because some guards had reported activity from outside that didn’t involve the masked clowns that usually broke the Joker out of Arkham.

Even more unusually, the Joker was not spotted during the following two weeks, nor were there any rumors of him gathering followers as he usually did after an escape. It normally took the Joker roughly four weeks to escape Arkham. This time, he’d escaped during the second week of his incarceration.

After that, Batman settled for beating up the Joker and leaving him wherever he’d found him and each time, a month passed before rumors spread of the Joker collecting more henchmen and threatening to blow up the city (or a hostage situation developed).

The Joker never once threatened to expose Bruce Wayne as the Batman. He’d threatened to rape and kill Batman’s wife and kids (of which they both knew Bruce had none), kidnapped Jim Gordon and his family multiple times and done genuine harm to _them_ , eventually causing Jim’s first wife to leave him, and murdered countless politicians, sure. But he never once even _hinted_ to others that there was a possible connection between Bruce Wayne, billionaire, and Batman, freak.

  


By year ten, things with the Joker were so complicated that Bruce no longer tried to explain them, either to himself or to others. They weren’t _friends_. In fact, they were mortal enemies. It was just hard to remember that when the police were more likely to shoot him than the Joker was (though the Joker was still more likely to knife him, and he _never_ hesitated). And even when they weren’t shooting at him, they were so _young_. These new, freshly-faced officers had been _children_ when Batman had first arrived in Gotham. They’d grown up hearing about him, either as a hero or a villain, and it bothered Bruce to know that.

Alfred said he was lonely.

The Joker said the fresh-faced recruits of the GCPD were _still_ children, and that toying with them was about as interesting as watching paint dry.

Harvey was gone. Rachel was gone. Lucius was gone (retired and out of Gotham, though he was still willing to help if Batman needed a new piece of armor, or some other new gadget his current consultant wasn’t having difficulty with). There’d been more new mayors than he could count, and aside from Jim Gordon, every single officer in GCPD, while not _entirely_ new, hadn’t been around when the Scarecrow had released fear toxin into the Narrows or the Joker had burned Harvey Dent’s face half off.

The Scarecrow was gone. The Penguin was gone. The Riddler was gone. Harleen, a woman Batman vaguely knew as having been involved with the Joker and following him into his life of crime and madness, had broken up with him a year ago and hadn’t set foot in Gotham since. That year, the Joker had mailed Bruce Wayne a time and location and when Batman had shown up to the abandoned pier, he’d been offered a bottle of vodka and a terse command to “don’t say _anything_ ”.

If Batman was alone, the Joker must be even _more_ alone.

Which led to now.

“All your goons are unconscious, Joker,” Batman growled, and threw a batarang at an elaborate mechanical _thing_ he couldn’t immediately identify. It looked sort of like a giant robot, but with more legs, and was painted in shades of bright red and green. Aside from the clang where metal met metal, nothing happened.

“Batman! Glad you could make it! I was getting so _lonely_ here without you! Are you still running from the law, or did Gotham’s finest send a SWAT team with you?” The Joker wielded a large machine gun, and in the time it took Batman to survey the room, it had been pointed at the door Batman had just entered from.

“Just me.” He rarely informed the police about the Joker nowadays, unless lives were actually at stake. He had gotten good at predicting the sorts of locations the Joker would hide out and plan in, and made of practice of storming them before things escalated to leveled buildings and hostage situations. Also, the Joker tended to kill policemen very, very quickly.

“Well, if it’s just little ol’ _you_.” The Joker tossed the machine gun away and lunged at him, knife out.

They grappled on the floor—Batman may have been the better fighter, but the Joker was still _fast_. He got in a lucky hit and Bruce felt a sharp pain as the Joker’s knife bit into his bicep before he twisted it out of his opponent’s grasp.

“How’s the butler?” The Joker asked as he scrambled for another weapon. “Getting old, isn’t he?”

“I gave him the week off. He’s doing okay. He’s aging well. Get another girlfriend yet?” He slammed the Joker’s head into the floor, twice. Blood smeared onto the concrete.

“No.” The Joker spat a mouthful of blood on the ground, and Bruce gave him a moment to catch his breath before throwing him bodily against the far wall. “Women are _so_ high-maintenance. You? Does the _Bat_ man have a squeeze yet?”

He shook his head, and ducked as a wicked-looking blade flew towards his face. “The women who date Bruce Wayne,” he ejected the blades on his forearms, driving the Joker away from what was undoubtedly a hidden cache of knives. “Aren’t interested in dating the Batman.”

Batman caught the Joker’s wrist before his stabbing motion was completed, and was surprised by a burst of gas coming from the tip of the blade. He coughed and recoiled at its acrid aroma. The Joker was already dodging away, his wide grin made more grotesque by the blood that dribbled from his nose and mouth, running a trail of red through his makeup-clad face.

“That, my dear Bat, is based off tear gas,” the Joker said triumphantly as Batman coughed uncontrollably, hands reaching to protect (too late) his eyes and nose. “At first, it’s almost the same, but unlike your everyday _garden_ -variety tear gas, the symptoms get worse over time. Soon, you won’t even be able to breathe.” He cackled.

True enough, Batman was having difficulty pausing his coughing and choking long enough to inhale a breath of air. The Joker nimbly dodged his lunges, his trademark laugh a familiar backdrop that no longer sent a chill of unease down his spine. When he started feeling too light-headed to even manage a retreat back to the Manor (the rebuilding had been completed in year three), he choked out reluctantly, “All right. You win this one, Joker,” each word an effort to expel.

Fifteen seconds later, he was gasping down vaguely medicinal-scented breaths of air as the Joker patiently sprayed puffs of the antidote into his face. If he weren’t the Joker, the action would have seemed tender. Instead, the Joker seemed to be aiming for his eyes, judging from the snickers each time Bruce flinched as the liquid entered his eyes.

“How’s the arm?”

Bruce made some experimental movements. The adrenaline had pushed most of the pain out of his mind, but now, it _hurt_ and he realized that it’d gone deeper than he had thought. But he was still able to move his arm, so he said, “How’s your face?”

The Joker licked his lips thoughtfully, and grinned, like they were sharing a private joke. In a sense, Bruce supposed they were. He bared his teeth at Batman; they were bloody, but all there. “You broke my nose.”

It looked a little crooked, so Bruce reached for the Joker’s face. When Bruce forced the Joker’s nose into its proper alignment, the Joker grimaced in pain and said, “Why Batsy. I didn’t know you cared.” It left a smear in the Joker’s makeup, the shape of Bruce’s gloved fingers.

“I’ll take a couple weeks to recover,” Batman conceded reluctantly as they moved apart. It’d take no more than a week to be mobile after taking the knife to his bicep, but it’d take significantly longer for him to recover from choking to death by having an allergic reaction to whatever the Joker’s newest poison gas was.

In that time, the Joker would have only the authorities to thwart whatever schemes he came up with, and Bruce Wayne would go out of town on business (or as a vacation) to avoid the temptation for Batman to come out and play.

The Joker didn’t speak until Batman was halfway through the kicked-open door. While the voice was mockingly cruel, it no longer infuriated him.

“See you next time, Bats.”

He was looking forward to it.  



End file.
